Olga Baclanova

In this name that follows Eastern Slavic naming customs, the patronymic is Vladimirovna and the family name is Baklanova or Baclanova.

Olga Baclanova
Born	Olga Vladimirovna Baklanova (1893-08-19)19 August 1893 Moscow, Russian Empire
Died	6 September 1974(1974-09-06) (aged 81) Vevey, Switzerland
Occupations	Actress radio host singer ballerina
Years active	1914–1925 (Russia), 1925–1955 (U.S.)
Spouse(s)	Vladimir Zoppi ​ ​ (m. 1922; div. 1929)​ Nicholas Soussanin ​ ​ (m. 1929; div. 1935)​ Richard Davis ​ (m. 1937)​
Children	2
Relatives	Gleb Baklanov (brother)

Olga Vladimirovna Baklanova (Russian: О́льга Влади́мировна Бакла́нова; 19 August 1893 – 6 September 1974), known professionally as Olga Baclanova, was a Russian Empire, Soviet and American actress of stage and screen, radio host and performer, operatic singer, and ballerina. She achieved prominence during the silent film era, after taking several years off her age and changing the spelling of her Russian surname from Baklanova. She was often billed under her last name only, as Baclanova, similarly to the surname-only nomenclature of her fellow countrywoman Nazimova.

An exotic blonde temptress, she was known as the "Russian Tigress". She emigrated to America in 1925, and started appearing in Hollywood films, which she remains most noted for portraying the fictional Duchess Josiana in the Universal Pictures silent The Man Who Laughs and slimy circus trapeze artist Cleopatra in Tod Browning's cult horror movie Freaks (1932), which features a cast of actual carnival sideshow freaks.

Early life, Moscow Arts Theatre and Russian career (radio, stage and film)

Olga Vladimirovna Baklanova was born on 19 August 1893 (other sources state 1884, 1896 or even 1900, according to her obituary) in Moscow, Russia. She was the daughter of Vladimir Baklanov and his wife Alexandra, herself an actress in early Russian films. She had 6 siblings, including later Soviet general and WWII hero Gleb Baklanov. Baclanova studied drama at the Cherniavsky Institute before being accepted into the prestigious Moscow Art Theatre with contemporaries such as Maria Ouspenskaya in 1912. Over the next decade she appeared in Russian films, and also performed extensively on stage, touring and performing in many countries of the world. In the 1930s, Baclanova had a program called Olga Baclanova's Continental Review, and she often appeared as a guest on radio programs singing songs in her native Russian, having trained in operatic voice at the Moscow Arts Theatre. In 1925 she was given the award "Merited Artist of the Republic", the highest Soviet artist honour. Baclanova appeared in around 17 films during her career in Russia.

American career

Baclanova first came to New York City with the 1925 touring production of the Moscow Art Theatre's Lysistrata. Though the rest of the company returned to Russia in 1926, she stayed in America. She would appear in a West Coast production of The Miracle, before being cast in a bit part in her debut film, The Dove. A statuesque blonde, Baclanova quickly established herself as a popular actress in American silent movies and achieved a notable success with The Docks of New York (1928), directed by Josef von Sternberg. Later that year, she also appeared in The Man Who Laughs as Duchess Josiana, the femme fatale love interest to Conrad Veidt's disfigured hero.

The introduction of talking films proved difficult for Baclanova, as audiences did not respond to her heavy Russian accent. She no longer secured leading roles, and was relegated to supporting parts. Her career was in decline when she was offered the role of the cruel circus performer Cleopatra in Tod Browning's film Freaks (1932). This horror movie, which featured actual carnival freaks, was highly controversial and screened only briefly before being withdrawn. It would be 30 years before Freaks gained a cult following. The movie did not revive Baclanova's film career, which ended in 1943.

Baclanova worked extensively on stage in London's West End and in New York, for about 10 years starting in the mid-1930s. In 1943 she appeared in Claudia at the Moore Theatre in Seattle, Washington.

Personal life

Olga Baclanova in 1922

Baclanova's father died a natural death in 1922 according to her family. She was married three times, firstly to lawyer Vladimir Zoppi, and bore two sons with her first and second husbands. The birth of her second son with actor Nicholas Soussanin was front page news and was covered quite extensively in the press in 1930. Her third marriage was to Russian-born David Judovitch, better known as Richard Davis (1900–1984), who owned the Fine Arts Theatre in New York. In 1931 Baclanova became a naturalised American citizen.

Legacy

Olga's likeness to the American pop singer Madonna in the 1980s has been frequently mentioned as particularly evident in The Man Who Laughs.

In Russia, Baclanova's departure from the USSR is well remembered for its involuntary significant contribution to the unrivaled success of a Soviet movie star Lyubov Orlova, a struggling ex-pianist with a certain likeness to Olga. In 1926, Orlova was promoted from a choir, after two months in a theatre, by the heart-broken Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko, a rumored lover and/or admirer of Baclanova, his favorite student. Fashion historian Alexander Vasilyev remembered in 2018: "He [Vladimir] loved her [Olga] in letters, he was thinking deeply about her. The only time he cried [publicly], at the piano in the Art Theatre foyer, was when he had found out about Olga Vladimirovna Baclanova [emigration]... He really began to cry. I'm sure of this, not because I was there but because I was a friend of Sophia Pilyavskaya who was also closely connected to Nemirovich-Danchenko and could have known this from the wife of the famous director... Lyubov Orlova blossomed as Baclanova's substitute."

Later years

After her retirement she migrated to Switzerland. She died at a rest home on 6 September 1974 in Vevey, Switzerland, aged 81, apparently suffering from Alzheimer's disease, although this is unconfirmed. She was interred at Corsier cemetery, in Corsier-sur-Vevey.

Partial Hollywood filmography

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1914	Simfoniya lyubvi i smerti
1914	Kogda zvuchat struny serdtsa
1915	Velikiy Magaraz
1915	Zhenshchina vampir	Title role
1915	Po trupam k schastyu
1915	Lyubov pod maskoy
1916	Tot, kto poluchaet poshchechiny	L'écuyère Consuella, qu'il tue par amour
1918	Khleb
1927	The Dove	Minor Role	Uncredited
1928	The Czarina's Secret	Catherine the Great - The Czarina	Short
1928	Three Sinners	Baroness Hilda Brings
1928	The Man Who Laughs	Duchess Josiana
1928	Street of Sin	Annie
1928	Forgotten Faces	Lilly Harlow
1928	The Docks of New York	Mrs. Lou Roberts
1928	The Woman Disputed	Countess	(scenes deleted)
1928	Avalanche	Grace Stillwell
1929	The Wolf of Wall Street	Olga
1929	A Dangerous Woman	Tania Gregory
1929	The Man I Love	Sonia Barondoff
1930	Cheer Up and Smile	Yvonne
1931	Are You There?	Countess Helenka
1931	The Great Lover	Mme. Savarova
1932	Freaks	Cleopatra
1932	Downstairs	Baroness Eloise von Burgen
1933	The Billion Dollar Scandal	Anna aka GoGo
1943	Claudia	Madame Daruschka

Stage roles (US and UK)

• The Miracle (west coast production,1926)
• The Farewell Supper (After on anatol), 1929
• Silent Witness (1931)
• Grand Hotel (1932)
• Twentieth Century (1932)
• The Cat and the Fiddle (west coast, 1932)
• $25 an Hour (Germaine Granville, 1933)
• Murder at the Vanities (Broadway Production, 1933)
• Mahogany Hill, Broadway, 1934)
• Going Place (London debut, 1936)
• Idiot's Delight (US tour), 1936
• Twentieth Century (US Tour revival, 1937)
• Claudia 1941–1943, US tour
• The Cat and the Fiddle (revival, New Jersey), 1945
• Louisiana Lady (summer stock, East Coast production, mid 1947)
• A Copy of Madame Aupic (East Coast, New Milford, summer stock, 1947)

External links

• Olga Baclanova at IMDb
• Olga Baclanova at Find a Grave
• Olga Baclanova at Virtual History